31 replies to this topic

[Dan]

Surely the piston crowns would need coating, they're aluminium!

Good point about the valve guides, they would certainly be subjected to a lot of corrosion as the charge flows over them. You could use standard iron guides for the inlet I suppose (the type most people are desperate to get rid of!) and nice manganese bronze ones for the exhaust since the exhaust valves are the hot ones and there should in theory be very little corrosive agent left in the gas flowing past them. Does mean you'd need plated inlet valves though rather than plain steel ones, how would chrome plating stand up to the fuel? I'd imagine it would be fine as it's fairly hard.

[Silicon Skum]

Surely the piston crowns would need coating, they're aluminium!

Good point about the valve guides, they would certainly be subjected to a lot of corrosion as the charge flows over them. You could use standard iron guides for the inlet I suppose (the type most people are desperate to get rid of!) and nice manganese bronze ones for the exhaust since the exhaust valves are the hot ones and there should in theory be very little corrosive agent left in the gas flowing past them. Does mean you'd need plated inlet valves though rather than plain steel ones, how would chrome plating stand up to the fuel? I'd imagine it would be fine as it's fairly hard.

Hmmm, good point about the piston crown, this would be in the direct flow of the intake charge. I susspect there would be no real problems while running at operating temperature, but cold starts could be another matter. Prolly the simplist way to solve this would be to use a nitrided piston, which could be done to the existing pistons fairly easy and prolly not too expensive. ordinary cars can be converted for use with e85, and as far as I'm aware, non of the conversions involves the piston crowns (or even the valves / guides).

I'll have to try to find out the details of the e85 compatable engines, see what the manufacturer has done to these parts, Though as I understand it, there doesn't seem to be too much concern over the piston crown, bore or valve areas, just the fuel system.

For the valve guides you could use Zirconium based guides and nitrided valves (expensive), but the iron guides would probably be the easier option. As far as I can tell, chrome plateing *should* be all right, but I do know that some chromium compounds are ethanol soluble. But I'm a bit curious about how badly the standard valves / guides, piston crowns and other parts would fair in a otherwise fairly standard engine.

There are just too many unknows to converting a mini engine, the only way this can be worked out properly, is for some one to run a mini engine on e85 for a long term test and see what damages is done, and what needs to be replaced / protected for a working conversion. Probably the best idea is to pick up a cheap 998 from the scrappy, give it the once - over and get it in good condition modify ONLY the fuel system (fuel lines, pump and carb for fueling rate required), then run it until it dies or covers a decent milage (20 or 30 thou miles should do nicely) then strip it down and look for problems. An engine expert like AC Dodd to do the inspection would would give us the information we need to convert an 'A' series over to e85.

It's for these reasons why I think Butanol is a better alternative for the A series, it's less corrosive than ethanol and more similar to the fuel the engine was designed for.

SS

[biggav]

There are otherways of breaking the water molecule without an electrolytic reaction... i figured a way out when i was at college, i have my files somehere!!!

waiting for knock at the door from oil company with blank cheque....

:'( Or a sudden heart attack with no other symptoms and no witnesses

[nev_payne]

I see Silicon Skums point here - I think the piston crown/guides area need not have protection...or at least on a minor scale - probably due to the little time there is where a fuel air mix is in the piston area before its ignited and exhausted.

[Silicon Skum]

There are otherways of breaking the water molecule without an electrolytic reaction... i figured a way out when i was at college, i have my files somehere!!!

waiting for knock at the door from oil company with blank cheque....

:'( Or a sudden heart attack with no other symptoms and no witnesses

Actually he died after taking a single drink of wine at a meeting with department of defence officials.......

Yeah there are a few ways to split water, extreme heat can break water down into hydrogen and oxygen (that would be a BAAAD fire to try to put out!). :'(

I see Silicon Skums point here - I think the piston crown/guides area need not have protection...or at least on a minor scale - probably due to the little time there is where a fuel air mix is in the piston area before its ignited and exhausted.

Yep, basiscally. I'm fairly sure that even something like Redex added to the tank would help keep these areas protected and lubricated a little better (ethanol is a powerfull de-greaser) by leaving a slight surface coating of oil during the intake charge. For the valve guids, maybe something like Teflon (PTFE) coating would help protect the soft metal from the ethanol, PTFE is pretty much inert so ethanol won't effect it.

Like I said, not really enough long term test information to work with here. Need to run an A series on straight e85 and see what breaks.

SS

[nev_payne]

That could be arranged Car doesnt necesarily have to be on the road either then again the engine doesnt have to be in a car!

[AlexM]

That could be arranged Car doesnt necesarily have to be on the road either then again the engine doesnt have to be in a car!

But that would not be ideal as you want to see how the engine runs in all situations, just like an engine running on unleaded.

[Jammy]

I was talking about this with my mate down the pub after reading through the thread last night. He said he knew a bit about it after watching some tv programme or reading some article. He said that it won't really help cut the usage of oil because of the amount of oil that will be used in the processing of the crop and the manufacturing of it into something usuable in cars?

[nev_payne]

Jammy - It's a question of time/production. With todays usage of E85 or crop-based fuel yes there is an arguement that there is still a need for a large % or oil needed in the manufacturing and distribution.

However as time prgresses and hopfully far more cars will use the fuel, the use of oil will decrease rapidly...what you have get a jist of in this arguemnt is the fact that oil companies and the government do not want their oil cash cow to disapear - articles that are not independantly written by say, Mr John Smith on his weblog, tend to have a fraction of governmental spin on them.

A perfect example of the gov. spin is this continuing time frame of 10-15 years for hydrogen or electric cars....the 10-15 year timeframe has been going on since the early 80's when people first attempted a hybrid car based on these power sources....its now been 25 years since then...and still no fully developed system.

[AlexM]

Or rather the oil companies try and make sure that no new successful ideas ever come to market, sinse they will buy the idea, patent it and then never use it. Meaning we will be stuck using their oil until the patents run out.

I believe GM themselves own patents to several truly amzing ideas, but they just havent made use of them!

Another thing, isn't it interesting how quite a few of the major oil companies are now referring to themselves as "energy" companies.

[Silicon Skum]

The reason that it *seems* like Bio fuel crops will not cut oil dependancy is a complicated one, but it realy comes down to the fact that most people are trying to use the current petrolium industry infrastructre as the model on which to base the production and delivery of Bio fuels. The two are simply incompatable and a HUGE energy waste.
Bio fuels ARE a sustainable and viable alternative to the petrolium industry if they are produced LOCALY by small indipendant producers, not made in the south coast areas and transported to the far north / scotland, requireing energy / fuel to do so.

It CAN be done and made to work well, it just needs a totaly different type of production and delivery infrastructre than the one used now, nothing more, nothing less.

Regardless of all the technology that is suppressed by the oil industry (and there IS evidence of this), the second that oil is no longer a cheap viable fuel feedstock, newer, "greener" and more alternative types of fuels and transport technology will become the 'norm' while the oil industry makes it look as if they have been working hard to make this "difficult" prospect to work efficiently and financially, all along. And the general public will swallow every word of it because of the misguided views fed to them, that it is not able to reduce oil dependancy. If you make a still and and a "waste" digester, it is possible to produce a substancial ammount of fuel to power a car, from just the waste produced by the average household (and there ARE people who do this already).

It will happen, but not until the oil companies have drained every penny's worth out of the natural oil stocks.

SS

[Russell]

sorry to bring up an old topic but i only just noticed it!
loads of interesting info there and clearly a lot of people who know lots more than me.
i'm in my second year of a motorsport degree and a small team of us are hopefully converting a uni race (formula student http://www.imeche.or...formulastudent/ ) car to run on E85 for the 2007 competition!
Its powered by a fuel injected 600cc triumph motorcycle engine but obviously most of the principles are still the same.
With regard to materials the ethanol deffinatley does corrode different materials to petrol however from my collegues who have spoken with people currently using the stuff (touring car teams(and i belive they have spoken to a le mans team who have used it in the past)) the problems with materials arent as great as research/theory might suggest. we've herd of aluminium being used in direct contact (fuel lines/pump components etc) and no problembs with standard aluminium pistons. Cold starting is a definate problem and that doesnt just mean cold days, it means starting the engine from cold which gets even worse on cold days! doh! One source has told us they have drilled holes into the inlet manifold to allow a tiny bit of normal petrol in for first firing (obviously great care is needed because with the engine set up for E85 pinking could occur very easily/immediatley running on petrol) this hole is the bunged up for normal running and used again after a run to spray WD40 in a flush through to stop component errosion!!
Like everything everyone seems to have different opinions and it is hard to know what to believe, i dont propose the above as the answer, just some of what we have found so far. The use of holes in inlet manifolds and cans of WD40 in an every day road car is obviosly rediculous for a start!
As for our progress materials are being tested in jars of the stuff while we speak with the aim of replacing any components that react extreamly badly before starting some initial dyno testing in late january when shell have said they can provide us with fuel.
All going to plan we will have finished the conversion and be running on E85 in the competition in July 2007.
Me and my collegues have a lot to learn and as i can see quite a few people are interested I will pop a post on here if we get it all working for the event, otherwise i will post problems we find and reasons for abandoning the project.
And as for mini's, well depending on how the uni project goes i might just start tinkering about with some left over E85 and my old 998
regards
tom

[minislapper]

Because of the cold starting problems the E85 has summer and winter grades. In Sweden during the winter the concentration can go down to E70.

Be very interested in your results looking at different metals. Are you checking the levels of metals in the fuels down to ppm concentrations ??

Grayedout

[Russell]

had a pm from jammy and just thought it may be of interest to others too........

Hey,

I was just reading a topic on the use of biofuels, and in particular E85 in a uni project, that you said would finish in July of this year? I'm very strongly thinking about building an A-series engine to put in my mini over winter that will run on biofuel (again, probably E85). Just wondered if you'd be willing to share some of your findings, particularly on how materials react with it, for instance, could I get away with using standard aluminium crown pistons?

Thanks,

James

Hey Jammy,

We did all of the hard work in converting the race car, lots of dyno work etc but didn't actually run with e85 in the competition because of last minute fears over our fuel tank size for an endurance race! The lower calorific value of E85 means the fuel consumption is approx 25% more and our fuel tank was originally designed to only just be big enough for petrol!
E85 is the most viable biofuel in my opinion, certainly at the moment. The conversion was actually very simple-essentially we just put E85 in and remapped the engine! We did some materials tests first and found only one problem and that was with one particular type of fuel tank baffle foam. The aluminium pistons are not a problem at all the fuel isnt really in contact with them because its already in a gaseous state by the time it enters the combustion chamber and then is burnt so quickly! To the best of my knowledge all E85 engines are using aluminium pistons, long long term effects of this wait to be seen!

To help get you thinking, my thoughts for the a series are as follows....
1) the rubber seal on the fuel filler cap may present a materials issue
2) fuel tank should be fine
3) float gauge in fuel tank might again present a materials issue
4) replace the little flexi hose from the fuel tank to the fuel line with some new modern fuel hose (should be fine) along with any other hosing for fuel pump etc etc.
5) i wouldn't use a mechanical a series fuel pump because a) I don't know if it will deliver enough fuel and b) if the diagphrams inside dissolve in the ethanol you will have fuel in your oil which could go bang and will ruin the lubrication properties of the oil at least!

Next is carbs or injection! i'm not sure what you were planning? but i think for e85 injection is the best way to go but we both know the a series doest take too kindly to injection all the time! in theory it could be done with a carb(s) but i just doubt its worth the hassle you would be looking at drilling out jets and super fine needles to get enough fueling then there is only a small knowledge base on tuning e85 and i dont think you could find anyone who really knew how best to set up the carb(s). Its hard enough to find someone who truly knows how to set them up for petrol!! also there may be materials issues with the brass bits in the carb and the float, jet etc the float housing is aluminium and fuel will be sitting in this so it may weaken or the fuel may get contaminated.
As i said, injection would definatley be preffered due to all the well known benefits but with the siamesed inlet ports on the a series head you might be best looking at the 7 or 8 port cross flow heads?! (hope your wallet is up to that!). Whatever head you use its probably best to stick with cast iron valve guides, theres nothing wrong with them and it saves any worries of materials issues.

E85 has an equivilant octane rating of about 104-105 Ron when the best petrol is about 99 this means you have the potential to run at much higher compression ratios and can advance the engines ignition to maximum power before any knocking occurs. Infact from our work to actually see a performance increase you will have to increase the comp ratio....this could be done using a small head chamber and skimming the head which is one plus side of the a series because you can do a lot before you have to worry about valves hitting pistons (still need to watch it of course!) or you could increase the comp ratio by looking at turbo or supercharging, these are both obviously huge modifications but would really allow the benefits to be seen.

Distributor ignition should be as good as it ever was but fully mapable is better/easier.

Hope thats enough to get you thinking! lol!
Let me know your thoughts and how you get on, as you can probably tell i am very interested!
any questions, just ask.

Tom

[Jammy]

Thanks Russell, big help! I'll PM you back over the weekend sometime when I have more time!